I have Win10 Pro on my Dell M4800 laptop and the audio has started stuttering/crackling no matter what I am using. It does it on Youtube, Netflix, games and also music software which is my main complaint. It even does it if I plug in headphones or a speaker so that rules out that the inbuilt speakers are failing. I have spent literally hours watching youtube videos (on my other laptop) and following recommended fixes and updated the drivers, changes the audio settings, etc. etc. and have had no luck so far! Any help on this very appreciated!
Load the Device Manager window.
Double-click the Sound Video And Game Controllers heading so the device(s) in it can be seen.
Double-click the Realtek High Definition Audio entry so its properties window can load.
Click the Driver tab.
What is the exact driver version and driver date listed there?
Driver version 6.0.1.6098 for Realtek High Definition Audio was released on December 7, 2015, so your Dell Precision M4800 notebook is using a very outdated driver.
I checked the support site for your notebook, and version 6.0.1.6098 is unfortunately the only downloadable audio driver listed for it.
The most current audio driver is version 6.0.8899.1 and was released on February 17, 2020.
It's my guess you're not "computer smart", so you should ask someone who is to help you update the audio driver.
There's no guarantee that updating the audio driver will resolve your sound issues, but it should still be updated.
Thanks for the vote of confidence Frank!
I'm ok with updating drivers etc, but as you said the only one I could find was that one from 2015 and that's even what the Dell website said.
How/where do I get the 2020 version from?
As for asking someone to help m that is 'computer smart', that would be someone like you right?
Frank, please can you help me with my audio driver update?
It was an assumption that I made, but I'm sorry that I offended you.
Go here.
Click the large green "Download" button.
Download and save that 305 MB-size .ZIP file inside an empty folder in your notebook.
Extract the contents of that .ZIP file inside that same folder.
Double-click the setup.exe file to start the install process of the audio driver.
Follow the directions from there.
Good luck.
So.... I've downloaded and installed the updated driver.
The good news is that the stuttering has gone!
hank you Frank!
Bad news is that I cant get the aux out to work now so only works on laptop speakers and not headphones?
Hi Frank, all sorted!
I can watch Netflix, use midi software etc without sny stuttering and the headphone jack is working which my wife is happy about!
Thank you so much for your patience with me and you help!
Have a great Easter Holiday!
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